


Eyes Wide Open

by BosieJan



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, Harry Hart Lives, Harry Hart is a Little Shit, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-19
Updated: 2016-06-19
Packaged: 2018-07-16 01:19:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7246429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BosieJan/pseuds/BosieJan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin is a master of waiting; he can watch an agent for hours as they survey a landscape for attack or seduce a mark in a foreign country, but waiting for Harry Hart to open his eyes is a goddamn <i>chore</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eyes Wide Open

On the long road to recovery, after being scooped up by the American response team and being transferred back to London proper, Harry had time to reflect during his medically-induced coma, though he wasn’t so much consciously remembering things as he was dreaming while unconscious.

It was Merlin that occupied his thoughts, for the most part. Eggsy made appearances on occasion, but never as often as Merlin. They’d been together far too long for anyone to top Harry’s thoughts other than Merlin, regardless of how close he and Eggsy had become prior to Harry’s ‘death’. Eggsy was a good lad and a very skilled Kingsman agent–the new Galahad, once he’d been sworn in properly–but Merlin would always be Harry’s number one priority.

2015 would have been Harry and Merlin’s twentieth year together as a common-law couple–Merlin refused to actually marry Harry on paper, due to some traumatic familial history he was never comfortable discussing–and Merlin had spent it in deep contemplation and mild panic; Kingsman had to rebuild London post V-day, while Harry spent it asleep. Finding out that Harry was alive was shock enough, but Merlin immediately forgot any sadness he may have carried, and continued on with small visits to the infirmary, wherein he petted Harry’s hair and pressed light kisses to his forehead when none of the medical staff was looking.

Merlin was a severely private man, and the fact that he and Harry were a couple wasn’t a secret within the organization, but Merlin still felt as if he were on the brink of being persecuted for it, as he had been in the past. It was easy for Harry to toddle off and be his magnificently bisexual self in the eighties and nineties, servicing men and women alike on honeypot missions, or simply seducing someone out of their flat keys to gain information from a safe hidden behind a family portrait.

But Merlin was different; covetous with his affections, he’d never be outwardly loving over anyone, no matter the situation. He could show interest or offer advice to floundering agents, but his love–traitorous, traitorous love–was reserved for Harry alone. 

Harry was going to live and he was going to recover to nearly ninety percent of his former functionality, as the medical staff had stated. Merlin was thankful for any percentage, so long as Harry remembered him and wasn’t a complete vegetable. He’d still love the man regardless of any newly-received handicap, but the fear was always very up-front; that Harry may not be the same man that had flown out to Kentucky over a year earlier.

_“The wound was easy to patch up and the Americans did a bang-up job on it, Merlin,”_ the chief medical officer had stated. _“But he’s been medically induced long enough that his muscles may have atrophied, and he may need physical therapy to walk again. I doubt any motor functions have been affected by the injury, but we’ll only know once he wakes and starts his recovery.”_

On the day Harry’s induced coma was to end, Merlin sent his duties to the secondary handler and booked the rest of the week off, barring any contact with him unless the world was ending once again. Medical staff were put on standby and Merlin sat eagerly and anxiously at Harry’s bedside, chewing the inside of his cheeks until he tasted blood and wringing his hands until his knuckles began to swell.

“Come on, you bloody tart,” Merlin swore, his forehead wrinkled with concern and his cheeks hurting from the constant chewing. “They’ve given you the go ahead to wake up and they’ve cut back the induction meds to make sure it happens. Time to wake your arse up. _Please_.”

The machines beeped on in their steady rhythm, Harry’s heartbeat and blood pressure still at normal levels, but neither indicating that Harry was about to wake. Merlin forced a medical staff member to sit and watch Harry as Merlin scooted to the loo, desperate for a piss after sitting for hours and not wanting to miss Harry’s reintroduction to the land of the living. He shooed the man away once returning and again took Harry’s hand in his, holding the warm but lifeless fingers to his mouth and kissing them reverently once he was alone with Harry.

“It doesn’t take fifteen hours to wake from a medical coma, Harry. Fucking hell, wake up. I know you’re in there somewhere, chattering about to yourself in that enormous brain of yours, but I need you back, you fucking trollop. Stop making me sit here alone.”

In Harry’s head, the haze was beginning to clear, but it only brought about the desire to stay asleep. He didn’t _know_ he was asleep, of course, but the sting of pain from his back was becoming very real, as was the brightness of the lights in the room behind his closed eyelids. Harry’s eyes moved beneath them and Merlin took in a shuttered breath, immediately letting go of Harry’s hand with one of his own and pressing the red Call button to alert the medical staff.

Harry’s head wound had long-since healed during his recovery so there weren’t any unsightly bandages to move while Harry woke up, but the amount of tubes and wires still attached to him were slowly peeled away, leaving only the heart monitors taped to his chest and of course his catheter. The unsavoury parts of being in Medical outweighed the fact that Harry could be _dead_ , and not simply laying in a comfortable bed with a tube stuffed into his prick.

His eyes hadn’t opened yet but it was sound that came from Harry first; a low groan as his back pain made itself known to Harry’s foggy mind. His eyebrows furrowed in discomfort and Merlin’s eyes were glued to Harry’s face, the handler no longer sitting but now standing beside Harry’s bed, leaning over him so Harry would see him when he opened his eyes.

“Aye, that’s it, sweetheart,” Merlin cooed, long past the worry of the medical staff hearing him coddle his partner. “Open those beautiful chocolate peepers and let me have a look at them. Christ, but I’ve fucking missed them.”

Harry’s throat moved as he tried to swallow, the tubes formerly down his throat having dried it out a little. His mouth opened and Harry grimaced at how dry he was, his eyes finally opening. The staff member to Merlin’s left immediately flicked the overhead light off above Harry’s bed, aware of how sensitive Harry’s eyes would be to the bright light, and then held a cup of room temperature water to Harry’s lips, a straw tucked between them.

“Close your mouth around this, sir,” the woman instructed, carefully cradling the back of Harry’s head to help him. “Take a slow drink and swallow carefully, all right? No choking on your first little drink.”

Harry did as instructed and coughed lightly, his face twisting into one of severe pain as the cough shook his aching back and joints. He turned his head away from the straw so the staff member and Merlin switched places, allowing the woman to take some of Harry’s readings while Merlin went back to staring into Harry’s face. 

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” Merlin said softly, brushing his fingertips over Harry’s cheeks and combing them through Harry’s hair. “Open your eyes for me.”

Harry’s nose wrinkled and then his eyes slowly opened, unfocused and watery, causing him to blink numerous times to clear them enough to see. Merlin was the only thing that came into focus after a few long moments and Harry’s eyes filled with tears, quickly mirrored by Merlin’s own. Harry tried to choke out a ‘hello, Merlin’, but he coughed hard instead, his voicebox just as out-of-sorts as the rest of him. 

Merlin sniffled loudly and felt the drip of a hot tear as it landed on his forearm, using the same arm to try to wipe them away, to no avail. He was laughing and sobbing at the same time–quite a mess but ignorant to even the med staff near him, as they gathered information from Harry’s machines. He leaned in and pressed his lips to Harry’s forehead, speaking against it so Harry would hear him clearly over the bustle of the staff behind him. 

“I knew you’d come back to me. You’re a fucking pain in the arse, but you’re _my_ pain in the arse, aren’t you? I’d go through it all again, if I knew you’d come back alive at the end of it.”

Harry couldn’t lift his arms to hug Merlin and Merlin was honestly doing a perfect job of crushing Harry with his own arms around him, though Merlin pulled away to wipe at his face again, then dab at Harry’s with a tissue handed off by a staff member. 

“There we go, just as beautiful as the day I first laid eyes on you.”

Merlin’s tears started again as a smile spread across Harry’s face upon hearing Merlin’s sappy words, but Harry was still unable to respond with what he wanted to say in return. He tried and it only came out like a croaked whisper, so Harry licked his lips and tried again.

Still nothing. Frustrated, Harry’s eyebrows drew close together and he mouthed the words instead, sure that Merlin would be able to read them. As chief handler, Merlin had run enough agents through their paces on silent video feeds, sending verbal instructions to them but only being able to receive mouthed replies from reflections in mirrors or windows. Lip-reading was something Merlin was good at.

_‘If that’s the case..I need a haircut.’_


End file.
